


the ghost of you (it keeps me awake)

by shadowdance



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ghosts, Dreams, Fire Emblem: Three Houses Golden Deer Route, M/M, Mentioned Blue Lions Students (Fire Emblem), Minor Injuries, Post-Timeskip | War Phase (Fire Emblem: Three Houses), Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-22
Updated: 2019-10-22
Packaged: 2020-12-28 15:08:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,016
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21138695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadowdance/pseuds/shadowdance
Summary: (You should've stayed dead.)After Gronder, Dimitri doesn't quite leave Sylvain.





	the ghost of you (it keeps me awake)

**Author's Note:**

> Dimitri and Sylvain's relationship really interests me. Ghost stories also interest me. And so this story got a little long.
> 
> Sylvain and Ashe are both in Claude's house, partially because I haven't done CF, and partially because it works a little bit better story-wise. Title is from Ghost by Ella Henderson.

The day after Gronder, Sylvain sees Dimitri standing before him.

At first he just believes it’s a trick of the eye—because that’s war, you see visions of dead people all the time. At the edge of the field, Dimitri stands with thousands of lances sheathed in his back. They weigh him down, bend his back over, and Sylvain thinks—_this is not how you should’ve died._ After all, Dimitri was raised to be the best knight, the best prince. He deserved a better death.

Sylvain blinks, so sure that Dimitri will disappear the moment he lifts his eyelids. But Dimitri still stands there, lances stabbed in his back, head lowered, shaggy blond hair covering his face. For one moment, though, he lifts his head, and his eye connects with Sylvain.

His gaze is hollow, dead. Sylvain is staring at a dead body, and he knows it. Yet a dead body does not blink, does not stagger on its own two feet. Dimitri does, and his gaze remains connected with Sylvain’s the whole time. Like he’s trying to say something. Like he’s trying to move towards him. Like he’s reaching out, trying to say—

“Sylvain?”

Ashe’s voice is tentative, small, but it breaks whatever hold Dimitri had on Sylvain. He turns to the archer, blinking furiously, like awakening from a dream.

“Yeah?”

Ashe shifts nervously. His gaze flicks to the corner where Dimitri stands, but he doesn’t appear to see anything. “Professor wants to see you,” he says. “Wants to talk about some battle strategies.”

Sylvain glances back at the corner, a little instinctively. Ashe peers behind him nervously, and Sylvain knows he wants to ask what he’s looking at, who he sees. But Ashe has always had a fear of ghosts, and Sylvain wouldn’t like to tease him in the wake of Gronder.

(But it isn’t a ghost, Sylvain almost says, it’s just Dimitri. But then he remembers Dimitri is dead now, that his name is a ghost’s name now.)

“Yeah, okay. I’m coming.”

He glances behind him one last time. Dimitri gazes back hollowly.

+

He dreams of Dimitri that night. This isn’t a surprise—after the horror show that was Gronder, Sylvain expected to see ghosts come to him. Expected to see Ingrid and Felix stare at him with disgust in their gaze, their words forming the same question—_why? Why? Why?_

But Dimitri is the only ghost who visits his dreams that night.

The spears are gone from his back, but he is still slightly hunched over, looking broken, shattered. His hair hangs limp in his face, but his eye seems more—alive. Human. Sylvain leans back.

“Hey, Your Highness. You look a little worse for wear.”

It’s the way he’s always talked to Dimitri, but the prince’s shoulders tense up, and his gaze fastens on Sylvain’s like he’s said something awful, like he’s insulted him.

“Sylvain,” he rasps, and his voice is a broken shell of what it once was. Deeper, rattling in his chest, but somehow truer than Sylvain has ever heard. “Why do you still call me that?”

Sylvain recoils. Only slightly.

“Uh—excuse me, Your Highness?”

Dimitri flexes his fingers, like he’s wishing to grasp something, break something. A weapon, a neck. Sylvain scoots backwards.

“I am no longer your prince. I have not been for awhile.”

Sylvain tenses.

“Yeah, well.” What is he supposed to say to that?

Dimitri looks up at him. His gaze is still hollow.

“Why won’t you say my name, Sylvain?” he asks, and a chill flutters up Sylvain’s spine. “We are friends, weren’t we?”

_Yes_—that is the correct answer. Yet Sylvain still hesitates, the word refusing to slip off his tongue. That is more than enough for Dimitri.

“Ah,” Dimitri says, and he leans back. Had he been the person he was in Gronder, Sylvain is sure he would try to strangle him. But this is a dream, or a place in-between, and Dimitri may look like he did before his death, but the words leaving his mouth are from his schoolboy days. “What did I do wrong, Sylvain?”

Sylvain remains silent. The words seem to echo in the spaces between.

“What did I do wrong?” Dimitri asks again. There is a hidden weight to his words. “What did I do wrong?”

He speaks in a whisper, but the words threaten to pull Sylvain down, to drown him in under that weight. He squeezes his eyes shut, as though that would block out the sound of the question.

But when he opens his eyes, the dream has faded away. He’s in his room. Sunlight is squeezing through the window, soft and dappled. His covers are a rumpled mess, his books scattered all over the place.

And in the corner is Dimitri, spears protruding from his back. He blinks at Sylvain—slow, curious. His gaze is empty once more.

Sylvain throws his pillow at him, and pushes his face against his mattress to avoid the dead prince’s gaze.

+

“You look terrible,” Ashe tells him. Sylvain frowns at him, blinking blearily.

“Uh, yeah. Bad dreams.”

Ashe has a book open on the dining table. Something about knights—Sylvain isn’t sure. He doesn’t want to look closer at the title, because then he might recognize it. Ingrid had made him read too many of those, after all. He knows most of them by heart.

And now Ingrid—well, Sylvain didn’t see her in battle, but he heard the dull thud of her body hitting the ground from the sky. And he heard Felix yell, somewhere across the way, and he watched Dimitri charge after Edelgard, watched the spears come up high and then—

Sylvain clenches his fork tightly. _Stop, _he tells himself. He doesn’t want to think about it. Doesn’t want to think about how his friends died, how he had to stand on the opposite side and listen to them scream. Doesn’t want to think about Dimitri, how vengeance had seemed to hook its claws into him and pull him apart, tear him apart like some wild animal.

He doesn’t want to. So he doesn’t.

He lifts his gaze, taking in the dining hall. It’s mostly deserted—Claude and Hilda are deep in discussion a few seats down, and Raphael is hovering over the food. Sylvain sighs, dragging a hand down his face, blinking blearily. And when he opens his eyes, Dimitri is standing there.

Not across from him, but against the wall. The spears weigh his back down, but his head is tilted upwards, his eye trained on Sylvain. When their gazes connect, he juts his chin upwards, as if he’s daring Sylvain to look away. _Challenging _him to look away. A question seems to burn in that hollow gaze of his, and Sylvain feels his stomach turn.

_Why did you leave me? Why did you leave me?_

“Sylvain?”

Ashe’s voice is light, tentative, but Sylvain can’t stop looking at Dimitri. His old friend stands there, his gaze somehow hollow yet pained, blank but hurt. It’s so strange; Sylvain has always known Dimitri to be a paradox within himself, especially from what Felix used to say, but he had never truly believed it. Yet the proof stands here now, as tangible as a ghost, as real as a dream.

“Sylvain, what are you looking at?”

Worry has crept in Ashe’s tone. Sylvain blinks, but Dimitri is still there. Still staring. He shakes his head.

“Nothing,” he ekes out, and wrenches his gaze from Dimitri’s.

+

The thing is, Sylvain doesn’t fear ghosts. He’s thought about them, sure, but he’s never been afraid of them. Never truly thought what they’d look like.

He never thought he’d see Dimitri as a ghost, though. Or Dimitri like—this. Shackled to the earth by the spears embedded in his back, his back hunched under the weight. His head almost remains low, like he’s forever waiting to be crowned. One blue eye, lone and hollow, traces Sylvain’s movements, following him even when Sylvain leaves the room.

It’s not real. It can’t be real. Sylvain has seen this process before, back when his own ghost was alive; he’s seen the names of the ghosts rise up and clamp their hands on Dimitri’s shoulders, whisper longings of revenge until Dimitri allowed himself to be pulled under. Had Sylvain been paying attention, maybe he could’ve reached his own hand out, before the spirits claimed Dimitri. Maybe if he had listened. Maybe if he hadn’t left. Maybe—

“Is this why you’re here?” Sylvain asks. He stares at the ghost before him. “Because I left you? Because I could’ve helped?” his voice is too bitter for its own good.

Dimitri only stares. He cannot talk in the light, or if he can, he doesn’t say anything. He cannot even move towards him, so Sylvain steps forward.

This isn’t real, Sylvain thinks, but when he places a hand on Dimitri’s shoulder, it’s steady. Firm. Cold. _Real._

His gaze travels up Dimitri’s face. He might be dead, but he still looks haunted; his face is gaunt, his eye blue and empty, his hair hanging limply in his face. If Sylvain squints hard enough, he can see other hands clenched on Dimitri’s cloak, hands trying to drag him back under. Hands holding the spears that are in his body, the spears that are a part of him now.

Sylvain swallows. He means to say _Dimitri _but what comes out instead is, “Why are you here?”

Dimitri does not say anything. His gaze merely flicks to Sylvain’s hand on his shoulder—another weight to his body—and he shudders, his bones shaking under his skin. Sylvain feels it.

Carefully, he removes his hand. He’s afraid Dimitri might crumple to the ground, might disappear into sunlight—but he’s still there.

And he’s still there when Sylvain turns his back and walks away. He doesn’t call after Sylvain, but that’s okay. Sylvain knows he wants him to turn around anyway, deep in his heart.

He knows he should. But he just keeps walking.

+

Dimitri doesn’t just haunt his waking hours, either. He comes to him in his dreams, and it infuriates Sylvain more than it should.

Because—it’s _Dimitri. _Of all the ghosts to stay, it’s him. Sylvain doesn’t understand, but then again, nothing has been making any sense.

“Why are you here?” he asks. He knows he shouldn’t speak unprompted to the prince, but Dimitri doesn’t talk in the daytime, doesn’t talk in his waking hours. Perhaps dreams are different—perhaps dreams is where he can get what he wants. In his dreams, after all, he can recall Dimitri’s voice easily.

Dimitri lowers his head. “What do you mean?”

They’re standing at the edge of a field. Itha Plains—Sylvain remembers this place. As children, they would run to the border of it, play with wooden swords and pretend to be soldiers in a war. They were never allowed to venture too far in; it was said beasts lived there.

Sylvain meets Dimitri’s gaze. In a territory full of monsters, Dimitri is the only beast standing before him.

“You’ve been following me,” Sylvain says. The sun is burning pale up in the sky, but he cannot feel the heat. “All day. I see you in the daylight.”

Dimitri blinks, slow and steady. “Are you sure that it’s not a dream?”

“Well, I saw you all day today. And this is a dream.”

Dimitri shrugs. “How can you be sure of it?”

Sylvain blinks, and the wan sunlight is gone. Gray clouds float cross the sky, and it should be cold but Sylvain feels nothing, nothing, nothing. In contrast, Dimitri tightens his hands around his cloak, pulling it tighter. Strange, Sylvain reflects, because Dimitri has never been bothered by the cold, always been at home in the snow and the bitter winds. He wonders, as a ghost, if it’s cold all the time. His body was cold when Sylvain touched it; could that be how he always is?

“Because you’re talking to me,” Sylvain says, although he sounds a little too uncertain now. “Can you not talk on the surface world?”

Dimitri shrugs. “Maybe I have nothing to say to you up there.”

“Oh, yeah, _sure._ Like I believe that.”

Dimitri tilts his head to the side. It’s really weird, at least to Sylvain, how young he looks; Dimitri was 23 years old when he dies, but the look in his gaze is reminiscent of when he was 17, when they were just kids at the academy. “What makes you say that?”

_Because you want to know why I left you_—but Sylvain holds his tongue this time. Dimitri truly looks so innocent, so concerned, and it messes with his head. The last time he ever saw Dimitri, he was seething for blood, for revenge, so consumed that he didn’t see his friends fall beneath him, drop one by one—

“Did you feel anything?” Sylvain asks. He means for it to sound harsh but it doesn’t, comes out all vulnerable and soft. “When they died. Did you _feel _it?”

Dimitri stares at him. Above, snow is starting to fall, gentle and light. “I should be the one asking questions.”

“No.” Sylvain curls his hands into fists. “I heard them scream, Your Highness. I heard them and I was on the other side of the field! I heard Ingrid, I heard Felix, I—”

His voice breaks, and he lowers his head. Dimitri merely stares at him, but there’s sympathy in his gaze, some kind of pity. At Gronder, Dimitri had none.

“Why?” Sylvain asks, and he lifts his head up. He’s not sure what he’s asking. “Why are you the one who is haunting me?”

He would understand if Ingrid haunted him, if Felix stared at him during the daytime. But it’s Dimitri. Only Dimitri. Nobody else.

Their screams don’t haunt him like Dimitri does.

The snow is falling harder now, almost blurring Sylvain’s vision. Still, though, he can see Dimitri is just gazing at him, expression blank, pity worn kindly in his gaze.

“Maybe it’s because we’re both looking for answers,” Dimitri says, and Sylvain’s breath hitches. “Maybe I don’t know.”

Sylvain laughs. “You’re the prince. You know everything.”

“I didn’t know what was different between you and me,” Dimitri says, and it’s this line, this one cruel line, that makes Sylvain shudder. The snow is coming down harder now, faster, quicker, and Sylvain can barely see Dimitri now. Barely hear his voice.

“Why did you have to go?” someone asks. Sylvain isn’t sure if it’s him or Dimitri talking. When he wakes up, he still doesn’t know.

+

Sylvain goes down to the graveyard.

There is no grave for Dimitri, of course. But Dimitri stands behind Jeralt’s grave, kneeling as though he’s in prayer. He is a wretched thing to look at, but Sylvain kneels next to him anyway. A part of him thinks that graveyards are different. That Dimitri can find his voice here, among the dead, and they can talk.

Sylvain closes his eyes. “Why are you still here?” he asks, and the question rings around the graveyard, forbidden and heavy.

He is unsurprised when Dimitri does not respond, but anger clenches hot in his chest. Because—this is the place where the dead stay in the living world, the place where Dimitri should be able to free his words. Yet all Dimitri does is kneel like a sinner.

Sylvain cannot afford to get angry in front of the dead. So he stashes it down, deep in his chest. He wishes, plaintively, there was a grave for all the fallen soldiers. For Ingrid and Felix and Mercedes and Dimitri—

But there could be none. They were enemies. The only grave they have is the one resting in Sylvain’s heart, the grief spilled in his heart, his lungs.

“You deserved a better end,” is all he can say, that is true and not cruel. Dimitri does not respond.

He doesn’t look up, even when Sylvain walks away. Which is good, Sylvain thinks. Let him stay in the graveyard. Let him stay with the dead, where he belongs.

Let him just stay dead.

+

But dead men do not leave dreams easily.

“You know, Sylvain,” Dimitri says, voice regretful, “I trusted you a lot.”

Sylvain blinks. They’re standing in the courtyard of the dorms, and it’s late. The moon is shining high, and voices flutter in and out of the dorms, but nobody else appears before them. It’s just him and Dimitri and the moonlight.

But Dimitri—

If Sylvain blinks, he sees the 17 year old, the prince, the boy who kept his demons at bay. But in the next heartbeat Dimitri is 23 again, bloody and dulled and ready for vengeance. The images keep flickering by, and Sylvain doesn’t know which one is the real Dimitri.

His gaze is the same, though, sincere and solemn. “You knew that, right, Sylvain?”

“Uh,” Sylvain says. “I knew that.” He didn’t.

“Good,” Dimitri says. He folds his hands together. “You knew you could rely on me, right?”

Sylvain feels uncomfortable. He tugs on his collar. “Yeah. Yeah, I did.”

“Okay,” Dimitri says, and his voice saddens. “So why didn’t you ever do so?”

“Do…what?”

Dimitri sighs. He rakes his fingers through his hair—bloodstained hair—and Sylvain sees the image of the young prince, flickering in his mind. In an instant, though, the older prince, the more broken one, is back.

“Was it something I said?” Dimitri asks, and oh _no _he sounds so heartbroken now, and even so Sylvain feels a lump in his throat. “Was it something I did? Because you know, Sylvain, you could’ve told me—”

“No,” Sylvain cuts off, springing to his feet. “No, no, no.”  
  
He can’t talk about this. It’s too hard. The subject is locked deep in his chest, buried deep in his heart, carefully veiled by all his true emotions. He thought, when Dimitri died, they’d never have to discuss this. Never go over it.

“Oh, Sylvain,” Dimitri says, and his voice is so soft. It sounds so unnatural coming from him that Sylvain turns away. “What did I do wrong?”

Sylvain’s hands clench. When he looks down, though, his armor is gone—he’s wearing his academy uniform again, his hair is falling in his eyes. When he looks up, Dimitri stands there, young and vulnerable, blue cape adorned brightly over his shoulder.

“I didn’t,” Sylvain huffs, but that’s all he gets out. “I didn’t abandon you, Your Highness. If you called my name, I would’ve been there.”

Dimitri closes his eye. The image of him blurs, and suddenly the war general stands before Sylvain again. When Sylvain looks at his own hands, the armor is back.

“But,” Dimitri says, and his voice is young and high, “that’s not what I asked. What did I do wrong, Sylvain? What could I have done to make you distrust me?”

Sylvain swallows. He is not ready for this conversation, even as the surge of memories come forward, tumbling in his mind, images upon images.

“It is nothing personal, Your Highness,” he says. “It never was.”

Dimitri closes his eye again. When he opens it, hurt is flashing in his gaze.

“What will it take for you to call me Dimitri again?”

Sylvain does not answer, because the light of the moon fades away, the sun comes up, and then the dream is gone.

+

Sylvain is pretty sure that, in the entirety of the Golden Deer, only Lysithea and Ashe believe in ghosts. But that might be because they’re afraid of them, and there’s a difference between _believing_ in ghosts and being _afraid_ of them.

But Sylvain likes Ashe, and he’s the only one he’ll trust with this subject, so he says one day, “You believe in ghosts, right, Ashe?”

Ashe drops the book he’s holding. “W-What?”

“Ghosts,” Sylvain repeats. In retrospect, this probably isn’t the right place to ask; they’re in the library, and Sylvain has heard rumors of it being haunted. Of course, it _is _right now_, _but nobody else can see this particular ghost. Dimitri just stands there, leaning against the shelves about knights. Naturally.

At least his blood isn’t getting on the pages, Sylvain thinks.

“Ghosts,” Ashe says, and Sylvain draws his attention back to the younger boy. His face is so pale that his freckles have disappeared; he almost looks like a ghost himself. “I mean…yeah. I do.”

“Really?”

Ashe’s eyes narrow. “Do you?”

Sylvain hesitates. His gaze flicks towards the dead prince, and Dimitri tilts his head to the side. In the low candlelight, he looks less like a ghost and more like a shadow. Sylvain supposes he is one, in a way; after all, Dimitri has been trailing him like one, like a piece of his soul that he cannot get rid of.

“Um, sort of,” he says, holding Dimitri’s gaze. “In a way.”

Ashe glances behind him. Of course, he sees nothing.

“What does that mean?”

Sylvain swallows. “I mean, I never really…believed in ghosts. Before the war started.” _Before I lost Dimitri. _“Although now, I’m not so sure.”

Against the bookshelves, Dimitri nods. His head is still crooked low.

Ashe frowns. He bends down and picks up his book, studying it. “It could be guilt, I guess,” he says, rifling through the pages. “I think it’s possible for grief to make a ghost.”  
  
But that’s not it, Sylvain wants to say. Because if it were really his grief manifesting ghosts, he would see Ingrid and Felix flank Dimitri’s side, hear them whisper words of betrayal in his ears. Sylvain knows what grief is, after all; when he lost his brother it came full force, washing over him even when he didn’t want it, when it felt undeserving.

He wishes he felt it now, wishes that it had pulled him under once more. But all he feels is some dull ache in his chest instead, like a tether. Maybe it’s being held back because of his ghost.

Sylvain looks at Dimitri. The prince only gazes back.

“I don’t think it’s grief,” Sylvain says, loud enough for Dimitri to hear. “I know that for certain.”

Ashe shrugs. “Oh, I don’t either,” he replies. “Just from what I’ve seen. But for a ghost to appear…it means you’re grieving in some way, right?” He shudders, like the thought scares him.

Sylvain regrets starting this topic.

“Yeah, yeah,” he says, and then nudges Ashe’s shoulder. “Can I grieve for a lost lover, then? I’d like to see their face one last time, maybe steal a last kiss…”

Ashe blanches. “You can’t kiss a ghost, Sylvain!”

“Never know until you’ve tried,” Sylvain says, winking, and snatches the book before Ashe can stop him, holds it high above the boy’s head.

+

He’s in Fhirdiad—the castle. The great, looming castle, where Sylvain had spent a good portion of his life running through, calling Dimitri’s name, hearing the prince’s name echo throughout the halls. The castle, where Dimitri had been born and then supposedly died in the ensuing chaos. The castle, which is probably nothing but a wreck now.

But it looks untouched now; it’s just the way Sylvain remembers it. And when he turns around, Dimitri is gazing back, his hair long and ragged in his face, his fists clenched tight.

“Oh, hey,” Sylvain says cautiously. He knows this is a dream, knows Dimitri isn’t there—but it feels so real.

Dimitri appears to not have noticed his cautious tone. “Do you remember when we used to play hide and seek in the castle?”

Sylvain frowns, rubbing the back of his neck. “Uh, yeah.”

“When you put your mind to it, you were rather good,” Dimitri muses. “I remember when you folded yourself in between two cabinets! That was rather impressive.”  
  
“I didn’t want to get caught.” Sylvain has had too much experience with that, after all.

“Well, you didn’t.” Dimitri laughs, and it sounds strange, so young and bright; it hurts to hear it. “In fact, you would have stayed there all afternoon, wouldn’t you? Except Ingrid noticed you were missing.”

Sylvain clenches his teeth when he hears Ingrid’s name, tries to ignore the stab of pain that goes through him. Ingrid hasn’t bothered to visit him.

“Yeah. But you found me, anyway.”

“It wasn’t me who found you,” Dimitri says, and now his voice is distant, a little sadder. The smile falls off his face. “It was Felix.”

Felix—Sylvain shifts and acts like his name doesn’t hurt.

“I guess I’ve never been able to find you,” Dimitri says, and now he sounds sad. His gaze turns solemn. “Is there a reason for that?”

Sylvain shifts uncomfortably. “No, I mean—you were my friend.”

“But not one of your closest ones. You didn’t consider me one in later years.”

What the hell, Sylvain wants to say. Where the hell did you get this information.

“What makes you say that?” he manages, and Dimitri sighs. He drags a hand down his face.

“I don’t know. Death has made me consider a lot of things I hadn’t before. And our last conversation…it made me think.”

Sylvain stiffens. This is a dream, he wants to shout, but meeting Dimitri’s eye, he’s not so sure. Dimitri speaks like somebody else, like he’s in control. This is _Sylvain’s _dream, yet the way Dimitri talks is off-script, like he’s dragging up words Sylvain had never thought of.

“Okay,” Sylvain says slowly. “You could never find me, that’s true.”

But there is something he can’t tell Dimitri, and it’s that he is good at hiding himself, good at throwing several layers upon himself. You’d have to strip them all away to find the boy hiding underneath, but Dimitri was never careful enough to do that. Dimitri never looked close enough to do that. In fact, Dimitri believed everything on the surface-level, believed everything Sylvain said, even when he lied.

When Miklan had punched him. When Miklan had thrown him down a well. When Miklan had beaten him to a bloody pulp and all Sylvain could chant was, _I’m fine I’m fine I’m fine, _Dimitri took it.

Dimitri believed him.

“But why?” Dimitri looks at him now, some kind of innocent confusion in his gaze. “Were you hiding from me?”

“No,” Sylvain says. _Lie. _“Not purposefully.” _Half-lie._

Dimitri stares. Sylvain lowers his gaze.

“I never hid around Ingrid and Felix.” _Where _are_ Ingrid and Felix_, he wants to say, but he knows Dimitri doesn’t know. Maybe they don’t care as much to haunt. Dimitri tilts his head.

“Yet that courtesy never extended to me?”

“I’m not gonna answer that.”

“Sylvain,” Dimitri says, and his voice is sad. “We were friends, you know. I liked to think we were.”

Sylvain stares at the boy in front of him. Boy, prince, ghost—but the boy who was his friend has been dead for a long time. Longer than the prince before him.

“You couldn’t find me,” Sylvain says. “Even after I left. But maybe”—his voice constricts—“Maybe I couldn’t find you, either.”

He doesn’t know what compelled him to say that. It doesn’t matter, anyway. Dimitri merely lowers his head, almost in prayer, and Sylvain finds himself doing the same.

_You can’t find me, Dimitri,_ he thinks. _And I don’t know where to find you._

+

The cathedral freaks Sylvain out, if he’s honest. It’s probably because he thinks he can hear the voices of the dead, sometimes, when nobody is talking; their echoes remain in the hall, after all.

The other reason is that Dimitri likes to haunt it.

_Atone for your sins _echoes in Sylvain’s head, as he sidles next to Ashe. The goddess statue is in ruins, but Sylvain can practically feel her gazing down at him, offering to take away his sins. No wonder Dimitri likes to visit it.

Ashe is studying the ruins, but he looks up when he sees Sylvain. A smile touches his lips. “Hey, what’s up?”

Sylvain opens his mouth, intending to let a witty joke spill out, but what actually comes out is, “Do you think there’s a reason ghosts haunt?”

Ashe’s smile instantly vanishes. “Oh, Sylvain—”

“No, I’m serious.” Sylvain folds his arms behind his neck. “Like. Is there a reason they want to stay behind? I thought everyone would want to move on. Being on this plane of existence is really shitty sometimes, you know.”

Ashe tenses, whether from the subject or the fact Sylvain is cursing in the cathedral. It’s probably a mixture of both. “What are you talking about?”

Sylvain lifts his head up. Near the rubble that had once been the statue of the goddess, Dimitri stands with his head bowed. Spears stick out of him, making for either a really grotesque sight, or a really poetic one. Sylvain can’t decide. He just knows that the painter boy, Ignatz or whatever, would probably love this picture.

“Why do ghosts haunt us?” Sylvain asks, calmer this time. More focused. Ashe frowns.

“I…I don’t know. Nobody really knows, do they? I don’t like to think about the why.”

“Ashe.”

“I’m serious.” Ashe holds his hands up. “I don’t know. I don’t like to think about it.”

Sylvain glances at Dimitri. He doesn’t look back.

“Okay,” he says, dropping his voice down. “But why do _you _think they haunt us?”

Now Ashe looks uncomfortable. Still, there’s no harm in discussing ghosts; daylight is streaming through the windows, and after all, Dimitri is harmless. So Sylvain waits.

“I think they’re looking for something,” Ashe says finally. Quietly, as though he doesn’t want any ghost to overhear. “Their work here is unfinished, or something. They didn’t find what they were looking for, or what they wanted to achieve here. So they haunt.”

Sylvain isn’t sure he likes that answer. It’s the same one Dimitri gave him, after all, a few dreams ago.

Instinctively, he glances back at the praying prince, almost expecting him to turn around. But Dimitri still stands with his back bent, the spears protruding from him like spikes, praying to the goddess. Praying to someone who won’t hear him.

Sylvain wonders, briefly, if the goddess will accept prayers from the dead. If she hears prayers from the dead. It’s not something he likes to think about, so he drops his gaze, looks at his feet.

Beyond, the dead man does not stop praying.

+

“Hey, Your Highness. What is it like, after death?”

Conand Tower this time. The place where Miklan died—the place where Sylvain didn’t know whether to be angry or relieved or full of grief. He still doesn’t know, even in his dreams.

Dimitri sits there, leaning against the broken wall. Sometimes lightning flashes, illuminating his face like a beast, giving him a wretched look, but it doesn’t matter to Sylvain. He knows it’s just Dimitri there, anyway. Not Miklan. Never Miklan.

“After death,” Dimitri repeats. His eyebrows curve down, giving the impression of a frown. “Why do you ask?”

Sylvain laughs, but it’s harsh, sharp and grated. “Oh, c’mon. You’re dead. What comes after death is one of the world’s great mysteries. But you know now, Your Highness?”

“No,” Dimitri says. His tone is flat, a little sorrowful. “No, I don’t.”

“You don’t?”

“Death hurt,” Dimitri says, and his gaze locks with Sylvain. “But I am still here. So I do not truly knows what lies beyond.”

Thunder rages in the sky above. Sylvain tilts his head up, but the rain does not catch his face.

“Why are you still here?” Sylvain asks. He sounds casual, but there’s an undercurrent to it, his tone laced with sharpness. “Is there any reason for you to remain behind? Do you wish to remain here or something?”

Dimitri frowns. Unlike Sylvain, the rain is able to touch his face—it curves down his jaw, catches in his hair. He shakes his head, and some water flies off.

“I am here for many reasons,” he says slowly. “But there are some things I left…incomplete here. Things I must fix, before I may move on.”

A nasty feeling settles in Sylvain’s stomach. He thinks he knows what Dimitri is talking about.

“You’re here for Edelgard, aren’t you?”

Dimitri does not answer. Above, the sky threatens to unleash more rain. Sylvain shakes his head, almost in disbelief. He should’ve known, really. Should’ve known Dimitri’s revenge would be able to bring him back from the dead, to tether him to the ground.

“Unbelievable,” he says, because that’s all there is. “Your desire for revenge even transcends death. Your Highness…you’re still chasing after that lucid nightmare, aren’t you?”

Dimtiri does not respond. The storm seems to worsen, and Sylvain raises his gaze to it once more. The water doesn’t hit him, but he feels something wet curve down his cheeks anyway.

He feels like—an idiot. A fool, that’s what he is; only a fool would believe that Dimitri would’ve come back for him. No. There is too much between them, a wide chasm; there is no way to cross that, even in death. Sylvain is not important enough for Dimitri, not important enough for Dimitri to crawl out of death. He left him, after all. Why would Dimitri care?

“I can’t believe death didn’t wake you up,” Sylvain continues. He wants to be angry, but there’s just a dull ache in his chest, robbing him of anger, of pain, of grief. He sounds emotionless, his tone terribly flat. “You realize it’s unhealthy to cling to that kind of dream, right?”

“I am not just here for Edelgard, Sylvain,” Dimitri says, and his voice is quiet, gentle. Sylvain can barely hear it over the rain, and he raises an eyebrow.

“Then what else are you here for?”

Dimitri shudders. He stands slowly, sways like he is being chained down.

“Oh, Sylvain,” he says, and his tone is so, so sad. “Why did you leave me?”

A lump hardens in Sylvain’s throat. “You’re not here for me,” he snaps. “You’re here for what I could never give you.”

Dimitri lowers his head. Above, thunder rolls across the sky, quick and bright. When it strikes the sky, illuminates Dimitri’s face, Sylvain swears he sees the bones underneath.

“No, Sylvain,” Dimitri says, and his voice is so soft the rain almost washes it out. “I miss you.”

Sylvain blinks. The rain is coming down harder now, but he still can’t feel it. Interestingly, though, his cheeks are wet, raindrops running down his face. When did that happen?

“Sylvain,” Dimitri says, and his voice is so, so soft. “Sylvain.”

The thunder drowns out his next words, but Sylvain hears it, hears him calling even as the dream fades out, as the storm falls apart, as he wakes up.

The dead man still calls for him.

_Sylvain. Sylvain. Sylvain—_

+

Sylvain had thought everyone died at Gronder. Mercedes, Ingrid, Felix, Dedue, Dimitri—he’d thought the only Blue Lions left were him and Ashe. Grief and guilt had burrowed itself in his chest, but then Dimitri came _back _and everything got thrown out of proportion. Still, Sylvain had thought the others were dead.

But he was wrong. Because in the shining capitol of Enbarr, Dedue emerges out of nowhere, battle-worn and scarred and _alive. _Sylvain doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry, and he sees Ashe’s face light up, relief evident in his gaze.

But then Dedue talks, and it becomes clear he is not the Dedue they know—that the Dedue he had known is good as dead anyway.

Dedue only talks about Edelgard’s head. He talks about removing it from her shoulders and offering it to Dimitri like an offering, and it’s _this _that makes Sylvain recoil, shudder from disgust. That’s not Dedue talking, even if it’s his mouth moving, his voice delivering the words in his usual flat tone. It’s Dimitri talking out of his mouth, Dimitri whispering in his mind, Dimitri urging him to continue his mission.

Frustration washes over Sylvain. Dimitri is _dead_—he should be in the ground buried, laid to rest with the ghosts that had haunted the prince during his life. Instead, Dimitri is _here_—inhabiting their minds and taking up space. Sylvain doesn’t have to turn around to know Dimitri is watching, his back stooped over from the weight of spears.

“Oh, no,” Ashe breathes, next to Sylvain, and Sylvain startles. When he looks at Ashe, the other boy is pale, knotting his fingers together. “Dedue…he can’t die. He’s not going to die, right?”

Sylvain twists around to glance at Dimitri. Again, the prince stands behind them, merely watching like a bystander. Sylvain expects to see disgust writhing in his gaze, or perhaps impassivity—but not grief, not horror.

Not a widened eye, not parted lips, not horror flashing in his gaze. But it’s there, all there. Dimitri’s body almost seems weighed down farther than usual, as though the spears are embellished with grief and impale him with it, drag him down to his knees. He looks up, and his gaze meets Sylvain’s; they hold each other’s gazes for one second.

Then Dimitri’s lips move. No sound comes out, but Sylvain can see the shape of his name, like a prayer, like a plea. _Sylvain—_

“He’ll live,” Sylvain says, and he’s not sure who he’s talking to, Ashe or Dimitri or even Dedue himself. It doesn’t matter, anyway. Dimitri is the only one listening. “He has to.”

An ache settles in his chest, heavy and hurting, but from what, he cannot say. He shuts his eyes.

_You should’ve stayed dead, Dimitri._

+

This time, Sylvain doesn’t wait for Dimitri to speak.

“You are going to let Dedue die,” he snarls, storming up to the prince. Dimitri is sitting on the ground, but Sylvain reaches out, yanking him up by the collar. “Get up, _Your Highness._”

Dimitri looks at him. His gaze is wide, although unsurprised. He seems like he was expecting this, at least. He does not speak, so Sylvain talks to fill the silences.

“Dedue is going to die for you,” Sylvain repeats, and anger throttles his tone. “He is going to _die _for _your _sake—and you’re not even here to see it! In both your lifetime and your death, you convinced all of the Blue Lions to finish what you started. They believed you because…because we’re from _Faerghus. _They thought it was the knightly thing to do. Do you not know how much damage you caused? How many needless deaths you made? Everyone is dead because of you! All of my friends are dead for your sake! They think they died honorably, fighting for Faerghus—but they were fighting for _you, _you and your stupid vengeance. You killed them, Dimitri. You killed—” his voice breaks, and he swallows, hard. There isn’t much else to say.

Dimitri is staring at him, face blank. He looks more ghostly than Sylvain has ever seen him, pale and blank and empty. But gently, his hand curls over Sylvain’s, resting on his collar. His touch is cool, and Sylvain jerks back.

“How funny,” he says, and his voice is soft, almost serene. “You finally said my name again.”

Something breaks in Sylvain. He shoves Dimitri away from him, as far as he can. His hands feel tainted with a ghost’s touch, disgusting.

“You want to know why I left, Dimitri?” his voice is somehow steady. “That’s why you’re here. You want to know why I left?”

Dimitri waits.

“_I don’t trust you._” Sylvain’s voice is a staccato, a whisper. He knows he should build it up with examples, with fancy words and evidence—but there is too much and there is too little to say. And it doesn’t matter, anyway. All that matters is that Dimitri knows the truth, simple as it is.

“You do not trust me?” Dimitri’s voice rises. Not with anger, though. It sounds almost like hurt. Sylvain nods, slowly.

“Yes.” His voice is too fragile now. He swallows it down and starts again. “You…I knew you, Dimitri. I knew what made you tick and what didn’t, I knew when you were really upset and you didn’t want to talk, I knew when you needed someone and when you didn’t. I tried my best to be there for you. I tried to take care of you.”

Dimitri smiles, but it’s bitter, a little regretful. “You were there,” he says. “After Duscur, I remember.”

“Yes.” Sylvain’s voice trembles. “I was always there for you.”

A heavy pause.

“But I wasn’t there for you.” Dimitri’s voice is soft, knowing. Filled with truth. A little awed by it, too. A lump hardens in Sylvain’s throat.

“I…you couldn’t be, not really. You never…you never understood. Not entirely.”

“About Miklan?”

“About many things.” Sylvain is thinking about Miklan, about Dimitri never pushing about Miklan. But he’s also thinking about Felix and his vehement disgust of knights, about Ingrid and her obsession with becoming one, about Faerghus and what it stands for, about everything in between.

And Dimitri is there. In all of it, all of them. He is a part of all the things Sylvain could not trust, of the things Sylvain could not look too closely at. Maybe that’s not the true Dimitri. But then again—who is?

“You did not trust me,” Dimitri repeats. He folds his hands together. “Is that why you left?”

Sylvain shrugs. “Part of it.” The other part—about Faerghus, about the Crest system, about everything he hated—is something Dimitri knows, at least somewhat.

Sylvain had thought the truth would hurt more—that he would feel some kind of awful clenching in his stomach, feel a wave of regret hit him. Moreover, he had thought Dimitri would lash out, scream and yell and fall apart. But this is a dream, and Dimitri is Dimitri. All he does is shudder slowly, shut his eye. When he opens it, a single tear runs down his cheek, and Sylvain’s heart lurches.

“I see,” Dimitri says, and his voice is sad. “I am sorry, Sylvain.”

Strangely, this is what almost brings Sylvain to tears. The years between them are too deep, too divided—but here Dimitri is, trying to give them back. Trying to understand, when Sylvain never thought he would.

“I am, too,” he manages.

They just stand there for one moment, a never-was king and a knight who left his home. The chasm is big, Sylvain thinks. But at least they can see each other on the other side now.

“Will you go now?” Sylvain asks. “I mean, now you know.”

Dimitri shakes his head. “No,” he says. “I told you. I have more unfinished business here.”

Right.

“Edelgard?” Sylvain snorts. It’s cruel. Dimitri shakes his head.

“Sylvain,” he says, and now Sylvain doesn’t know if his name is being used as a weapon or an answer. “Sylvain—”

When he wakes up, Dimitri’s lips are still forming his name.

+

A part of Sylvain still thinks—when they kill Edelgard, Dimitri will go away. That if they fulfill Dimitri’s request, his ghost will vanish. Because Sylvain isn’t important enough for Dimitri to remain behind—Edelgard has always taken priority. So he thinks, anyway.

But it doesn’t happen. Byleth kills Edelgard and Dimitri is standing in the corner, watching, his face entirely slack. Sylvain blinks, rubs his eyes, but Dimitri is still there, gaze trained on Edelgard’s broken body.

_What is it, Dimitri? _Sylvain thinks, curling his hands into fists. _What could you still have down here? We did what you wanted us to do, Dimitri. What is it? _

“Sylvain.”  
  
Ashe comes up to him. His eyes are tired, blood splattered over his freckles. Sylvain looks away from Dimitri to look at him.

“Have you seen Dedue?” Ashe asks him. “I wanted to talk to him…”

Sylvain shakes his head. Ashe sighs, blowing his bangs out of his face.

“Ah, well.” He smiles then, something rueful; it looks almost out of place. “His Highness would’ve been happy though, yeah? As terrible as this sounds…I hope this lets his soul rest.”

Sylvain glances behind him. Dimitri stands there, although the expression on his face isn’t one of pride. It looks more—shocked. Tired. Like they did what he could never do.

“I believe it will,” he says, looking Dimitri in the eye.

Dimitri is the one who looks away first.

+

This time, they’re standing in Gronder Field. _What the hell, _Sylvain thinks, because this is the worst place they could ever be. They’re standing on the platform, and Dimitri is gazing at him.

“Hello, Sylvain.”

Sylvain swallows. “Hey. Are you going to go now?”

A pause. Dimitri’s shoulders sag.

“Do you want me to?”

There’s a lot Sylvain has been thinking about. The sound of Dimitri calling his name, always afflicted with a sigh; the pain he never realized Dimitri felt, when he left; the horrific screech that escaped Dimitri’s lips, the moment the spears came down. There’s a lot of history between them, yet Sylvain cannot say it was all that pleasant. He wishes it had been.

“You said you unfinished business,” Sylvain says. “What could it be?”

Dimitri stares at him. There’s something different in his gaze—it seems less guarded, like his walls have come down. In fact, it’s something almost soft, almost kind. Almost yearning.

Oh, Sylvain thinks, when Dimitri steps closer to him. His touch is but a wisp of it when his hand presses against Sylvain’s cheek, light and cold. _Oh_.

“Sylvain,” Dimitri says, and it’s a whisper now, broken and sad. “I _miss_ you.”

Sylvain swallows. Dimitri’s gaze is warm, almost fond. For the first time, he allows himself to wish that the prince had not died. That he was truly still here, that he had never truly left. But maybe this is fair, in some way. Sylvain left him first. Dimitri is only repaying the favor. If he hadn’t left—if he hadn’t swallowed down his broken trust—

There’s no room to fix it in the present, but they’re both here now, on the ruins of a battlefield. Sylvain takes a deep breath, and then pushes himself forward and kisses him.

He tastes—disgusting. Like blood, like war. Frankly, it’s not like anything Sylvain had ever thought of, mostly because kissing Dimitri was something he never allowed himself to think about. But it’s not—terrible, really. Far from it. He curls one hand on Dimitri’s shoulder, his grip firm. Reminding himself that he is steady. Reminding himself that he is here.

Sylvain is the one who starts it, and he is the one who ends it. He presses his forehead against Dimitri’s, breathes in deeply. Their breathing is in tandem, almost. Sylvain can hear Dimitri _breathe._

“I never left you,” Sylvain says quietly. “Not really.”

Dimitri blinks. But then his mouth breaks into a smile, warm and soft and real. Genuine. Sylvain likes it. He wishes Dimitri wasn’t—gone.

“You should sleep now,” he says. “I am here with you.”

Sylvain frowns. This is a dream—he is already asleep. But then Dimitri presses his lips against his forehead, and it’s such a shockingly kind gesture that it makes his heart ache. It almost makes him want to cry, but he doesn’t. He can’t.

He closes his eyes.

+

Sylvain opens his eyes in his room. His armor is resting on the dresser, and his covers are thrown sideways.

And Dimitri isn’t there.

Sylvain sits up, fast. He peers in the corners, taking in his room slowly, but Dimitri is gone. There is no trace of him, no sign he was ever here. Sylvain almost considers calling his name, but that would be calling for a dead man.

He slumps his shoulders. Was Dimitri ever really with him? His skin had felt cold under Sylvain’s fingertips, firm and real, but even that feels like a faded memory. It scares him, to think that Dimitri has been haunting him for so long, and yet was never really there. Never was here. He touches his lips with his fingertips, lightly.

He can still taste the blood in his mouth.


End file.
